Tempests

Ada NegriProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

4.0

Word count: 91K words
Chapters: 10

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Tempeste by Ada NegriAuthor: Negri, Ada, 1870-1945,Language: Italian, Class: PQ: Language and Literatures: Romance literatures: French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Release Date: May 8, 2011

Editor's review

This is the public-domain electronic text of Tempeste (Storms), a poetry collection by the Italian poet Ada Negri (1870–1945), released by Project Gutenberg. Negri is known for lyric poetry steeped in the lives of the poor and charged with intense feeling, and the title itself evokes the surging emotions and sense of fate that run through the book. Its value as a public-domain ebook lies first in accessibility: readers can encounter late nineteenth-century Italian poetry in the original at no cost, making it suitable for close reading, translation practice, or supplementary material in a history of Italian poetry. Note that this edition is an electronic transcription from Project Gutenberg; the text is in Italian and includes no modern translation notes or introduction, so the reading experience is closer to a raw document than a popular edition. It best suits readers with some Italian who are interested in Italian literature or women's writing, to be read slowly and savored in a quiet setting rather than for plot-driven leisure reading.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers with a foundation in Italian who want to encounter late nineteenth-century Italian poetry in the original
Readers studying Italian literature or writing by women poets who need a public-domain text for close reading
Language learners doing translation practice who want short lyric poems as material
Readers who enjoy emotionally intense, fate-haunted lyric poetry and do not rely on annotations

Not a good fit for

General readers with no Italian who want a Chinese translation
Beginners who need a detailed introduction, annotations, or modern typesetting
Readers who prefer narrative plot and have limited patience for poetry

Reading tips

First read through the table of contents and the short poems, then choose two or three to read aloud repeatedly and feel the rhythm and emotion of the Italian.
Do not look up unfamiliar words immediately; finish a passage first and then return to it, preserving a coherent grasp of each poem's mood.
You may consult an Italian dictionary or online translation for comparison, but avoid word-for-word rendering, which breaks the feel of the language.
After reading a group of poems, jot down a few lines in Chinese recording images and emotional threads for later review.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is this book in Chinese or Italian?

The text is in the original Italian. This is a public-domain electronic text released by Project Gutenberg with no Chinese translation, so some knowledge of Italian is needed to read it.

Can I understand it without notes or an introduction?

Yes, but you will need to supply the background yourself. It helps to learn a little about Negri's life and the general character of late nineteenth-century Italian poetry, then read poem by poem with a dictionary; do not expect to grasp everything at once.

Is this collection suitable for learning Italian?

It suits intermediate and advanced learners for literary reading practice. The language of poetry is condensed and the syntax flexible, so it is not recommended for beginners, but with some grammar under your belt it is an effective way to train feel for the language and vocabulary.

Comments

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About the author

Ada Negri Author · Italian · 1870–1945

Ada Negri (1870–1945) was an Italian poet and writer, born into a working-class family in Lodi. She rose to fame in 1892 with her poetry collection Fatalità, and went on to publish Tempeste, Maternità, Dal profondo, Esilio, and Orazioni. Her poems draw heavily on the hardships of the poor and the fate of women, written in a direct and emotionally intense style that combines social concern with personal lyricism. In library classifications she is often placed under inspirational and personal growth, reflecting how her work, beyond its depiction of suffering, conveys resilience and self-development. In 1940 she became the first woman admitted to the Italian Academy, a distinction that added public significance to a female writer long overlooked.